Low-emissions coal, credits from state will help power plant meet regulations

Lisa Guerriero

Saturday

Jul 26, 2008 at 12:01 AMJul 26, 2008 at 7:53 PM

The owners of Salem Harbor Station say they’re here to stay and have a plan to live up to state regulations – although environmental activists have their doubts.

The owners of Salem Harbor Station say they’re here to stay and have a plan to live up to state regulations – although environmental activists have their doubts.

“We are confident Salem Harbor can and will continue to serve you with reliable electricity for years to come,” reads a notice the Virginia-based owners, Dominion, placed in the July 25 Salem Gazette.

Jim Norvelle, a spokesman for Dominion, said given larger economic factors, it’s difficult for the company to predict the future, but he pointed to regulatory-compliance plans being made as evidence of the company’s intention to remain in Salem.

“We’re certainly looking at 2012,” he said. “That’s four-plus years.”

When Dominion took over the plant in 2005, it made an agreement with the state that it would present a plan for meeting Massachusetts environmental standards by this month. Dominion is currently in compliance with the regulations, but needed to present a plan showing how it will meet the more stringent standards that take effect in 2011, including the carbon-dioxide-limiting Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI).

On Thursday afternoon, Dominion leaders and employee union officials had a closed-door meeting at the Wilmington offices of the state Department of Environmental Protection, with Mayor Kim Driscoll and members of several environmental groups also present.

The news that Dominion will rely heavily on existing practices and a cap-and-trade program to achieve compliance came as no surprise to Pat Gozemba, a Salem resident who attended the meeting as a member of the environmental-group contingent.

“Dominion is meeting the regulations sort of on the cheap. They put a Band-Aid on the problem, metaphorically,” said Gozemba.

Mercury emissions

Norvelle said Dominion successfully tested mercury-reduction equipment at Unit 1 Salem Harbor Station this spring, using a fairly common process called activated-carbon injection, which traps some of the mercury before it can leave the stack.

“It’s a tool we’re looking at using,” said Norvelle. “We’re not sure whether we’ll be using it, but it’s an idea.”

If Dominion decides activated-carbon injection is the best way to meet the cap on mercury emissions, it would be willing to spend up to $10 to $15 million on the necessary equipment. If not, Norvelle said, the company would find another way to meet the mercury restriction on coal-burning units.

“We believe we have the equipment in place to comply with the high standards of Massachusetts,” said Norvelle.

Sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions

Salem Harbor Station began using low-emissions coal after Dominion bought the plant in 2005, Norvelle said, and it has allowed the company to meet the state’s current emissions standards for sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide.

The two compounds are considered common air pollutants, which pose a risk to public health and the environment, according to the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

Norvelle said the same “low-e” coal would allow the Salem plant to continue meeting regulations through 2011, since the caps on the two compounds will not change during that time, meaning the company will not have to take steps to reduce them further.

“The quality of the low-emissions coal -- which is low in sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and other restricted components -- allows us to comply with Massachusetts regulations,” Norvelle said.

In a way, Norvelle said, the company lucked out, as the low-emissions coal Dominion gets from South America was harder to come by before 2005. It “allows us meet very tough standards without having to spend the dollars necessary on the equipment,” he said of the coal, which is more expensive than some alternatives.

Carbon dioxide emissions

Carbon dioxide is a compound blamed for global warming, and it is restricted by the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, adopted by Massachusetts last year.

Dominion has no plans in place to add equipment to limit CO2 emissions, and is planning to participate in a new program that would require companies like Dominion to purchase allowances for emissions— every ton they emit will cost them.

“The first auction begins in September, and we will be a full participant in that to comply with regulations,” said Norvelle.

The Sept. 25 auction will offer up to 12.5 million CO2 allowances, according to a statement from the DEP on Thursday, divvied up among the parties to the RGGI: Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Rhode Island and Vermont. Proceeds will be used to fund energy-conservation efforts and alternative-energy projects in participating states.

In Massachusetts, some of the money will be put aside for the city of Salem, to mitigate any loss of tax receipts from Dominion that might occur this year and the next two years as a result of the cost to the company of the new energy policies.

Since the cap-and-trade program is the first of its kind in Massachusetts and in the U.S. -- the governor signed it into law on July 2 -- officials say they cannot predict many details. The worth of each share is still unknown, as is the total revenues the state can expect to generate, although some predictions figure in the $50 to $100 million range.

Groups criticize ‘smoke screen’

The solutions presented by Dominion failed to satisfy representatives of several groups at the meeting on Thursday, including Clean Water Action, the Conservation Law Foundation and the North Shore-based HealthLink and Wenham Lake Watershed Association.

Gozemba, who lives near the plant and belongs to HealthLink and Salem Alliance for the Environment (SAFE), said Dominion presented only vague plans that fail to actually reduce air pollution. The cap-and-trade program, she said, allows the company to buy its way into compliance instead of installing equipment to reduce emissions.

“They’re not concerned about what’s coming out of stacks when they’re relying on credits. That means you and I are breathing more pollution,” Gozemba said.

She points to Salem Harbor Station’s sister plant, Brayton Point, a larger facility in Somerset, where Dominion pledged to spend $1 billion since 2005 on pollution control and where equipment has already been installed to achieve that goal.

Novelle said the size of the Brayton Point facility is exactly the reason the company has been able to spend more.

“At Brayton Point it made sense to do it [meet regulations] via equipment … it generates more megawatts, so we’re able to spread the cost of the equipment necessary,” Novelle said, adding that the company will nonetheless “be in compliance in both locations.”

Gozemba says that’s not enough. She said Dominion is still failing to address human-rights issues in Columbia, where it gets the coal for the plants, the broader safety implications of the November 2007 accident that killed three workers and the need for more charitable donations.

Novelle said disagreed strongly, saying, “I would argue there are a lot more folks in Salem who are pleased today that we’re going to be remaining, because of our contributions to the community in the way of payroll and taxes; in the way of the ancillary businesses we do business with.”

Convinced that Dominion isn’t investing in emissions-reducing equipment because they expect to leave Salem in the not-too-distant future, Gozemba said Salem residents need to start thinking now about redevelopment of the property.

According to a public statement and comments from its spokesman, Dominion actions should not be taken as a lack of commitment to the environment and health of its neighbors but rather an attempt to follow the protocol established by Massachusetts and the RGGI states.

“This is way the 10 states in the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative chose to write their regulations,” said Norvelle.

He continued, “People also need to remember, Massachusetts has the toughest air-emissions standards in the country, maybe with the exception of California. Those standards are set to protect human health, and we are in compliance with them and will be in compliance with them going forward.”